Westinghouse has no major ‘impact’

1,150-megawatt AP1000 reactors in China, representing the country’s first implementation of such a reactor design.

The project is also the world’s first Westinghousedesigned AP1000 reactor project.

Construction started at Sanmen, Zhejiang province and at Haiyang, Shandong province in 2009. The first AP1000 reactor was due to be delivered in 2014.

However, construction was put on hold after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in 2011, when approval for new nuclear plants was suspended and a nationwide safety review was launched.

One Chinese industry expert on Thursday said that the precise impact of the US group’s demise was difficult to fully gauge.

“At present, it’s difficult to judge the potential influence of the Westinghouse restructuring on the project, as the details have yet to be released,” said Xu Yuming, deputy secretary-general of the China Nuclear Energy Association.

He added that the Westinghouse bankruptcy might give Hualong One — China’s domestically developed thirdgeneration reactor — an advantage in the marketplace.

He Yu, chairman of China General Nuclear Power Corp, said China should build four to six nuclear reactors annually, using its Hualong One, to ensure that the capacity of the nuclear power in China reach at least 150 gigawatts by 2030.

Contact the writers at jingshuiyu@chinadaily.com.cn